Rob and I have bought a small plot in Mid Wales near where we live and the plan is to build a 4-bed energy efficient house. It is going to drive us insane! In the meantime, as a university researcher and trainee archivist I'm going to explore some of the records out there on and effecting self-builds. Wish us luck…

Tuesday, 25 September 2012

Sole Plate and missing bricks...a good band title?

It has been a while since the excitement of the concrete pour but to be honest, the thrill of having that done has sustained us while the frame and technical drawings were finalised over August and the site cleared up ready for the next onslaught...once the digger and concrete pour vehicles came off site the plot which we'd always felt was quite small, it suddenly felt a lot bigger to me.

Our builder, Colin, and Rob spent an hour marking out all the no go areas for fixing the sole plate to the concrete so our precious under floor heating pipes don't get pierced - the endless measuring we did before the pour clearly makes sense! The dug out bit is the downstairs wetroom and the water needs to drain down - could be an issue later but will have to see.

Typically, the date set for starting this next phase was yesterday, 24th August, when it proceeded to pour down again...and it hasn't stopped since! But rain or not (and you can't see the downpour in the photos but it really was there) the guys came down and got on with fixing the sole plate (had to check the spelling and found Wikipedia was useful...although I reckon our pictures would help!):

And you can just see the Rhododendrons (had to check that spelling too! that Rob has planted below the hedge and above the wall in the above photograph - they seem to grow pretty well here so we're hoping it won't be totally barren when we move in...

Wednesday is the day for the internal membrane to be fitted to the sole plate, so the rolls stored in our hallway and boxes of very expensive tape can be put to use at last, and then the frame work can start on Thursday...it might even stop raining at some point!